78Appearance by authorised representative

(1) Any assessee who is entitled or required to attend before any tax authority or the Appellate Tribunal, in connection with any proceeding under this Act, may attend through an authorised representative.

(2) The provisions of sub-section (1) shall not apply in a case where the assessee is required to attend personally for examination on oath or affirmation under section 8.

(3) In this section, "authorised representative" means a person authorised by the assessee in writing to appear on his behalf, being—

(a) a person related to the assessee in any manner, or a person regularly employed by the assessee;

(b) any officer of a scheduled bank with which the assessee maintains a current account or has other regular dealings;

(c) any legal practitioner who is entitled to practice in any civil court in India;

(d) an accountant;

(e) any person who has passed any accountancy examination recognised in this behalf by the Board; or

(f) any person who has acquired such educational qualifications as may be prescribed.

(4) The following persons shall not be qualified to represent an assessee under sub-section (1), namely:—

(a) a person who has been dismissed or removed from Government service;

(b) a legal practitioner, or an accountant, who is found guilty of misconduct in his professional capacity by any authority entitled to institute disciplinary proceedings against him;

(c) a person, not being a legal practitioner or an accountant, who is found guilty of misconduct in any tax proceedings by such authority as may be prescribed.

(5) The Principal Chief Commissioner or the Chief Commissioner may, by an order in writing, specify the period upto which the disqualification under sub-section (4) shall continue, having regard to the nature of misconduct and such disqualification shall not exceed—

(i) in case of clauses (a) and (c) of sub-section (4), a period of ten years;

(ii) in case of clause (b) of sub-section (4), the period for which the legal practitioner or an accountant is not entitled to practice.

(6) A person shall not be allowed to appear as an authorised representative, if he has committed any fraud or misrepresented the facts which resulted in loss to the revenue and that person has been declared as such by an order of the Principal Chief Commissioner or the Chief Commissioner.

Explanation.—In this section, "accountant" means a chartered accountant as defined in clause (b) of sub-section (1) of section 2 of the Chartered Accountants Act, 1949 (38 of 1949) who holds a valid certificate of practice under sub-section (1) of section 6 of that Act.